“The most exciting thing I aspire to do is to write something new that I know is going to work, or perform something that I know is going to make people laugh.”

Battered Women: sounds delicious. Doesn’t make it right.

It’s not always enough to be brave, I realized years later. You have to be brave and contribute something positive, too. Brave on its own is just a party trick.

Travel is impossible, but daydreaming about travel is easy.

Nobody remembers how long anything takes; they only remember how good it was in the end.

If people are well paid for reality television and cotton candy and dunking a basketball, why can’t they be well paid for changing young minds?

Regret is just perfectionism plus time.

I think it’s better to not know certain things. It gives the world an extra bit of mystery, which is important to us as human beings.

Different people have different styles, but there is an opportunity as a director to be a writer in every moment, with every visual cue and every piece of production design. Everything is a decision, and everything can be obsessed over.

I wanted to be a writer first, and I struck out in the world to be a writer first, and then found stand-up as a more creative outlet, as a 3D way to be creative.

Mindy Kaling gets her own line in the acknowledgments, as previously negotiated by her representatives. Thanks, Mindy. I love you and you’re the best.

Perfect. Why was this so hard to find?”The other type of perfect is the type you never could have expected and then could never replicate.

If you love something, let it go. If you don’t love something, definitely let it go. Basically, just drop everything, who cares.

There’s not many good comedies to watch – you know, comedies that make you glad you watched them.

Good comics gravitate to each other; you know who’s your type of person by watching them onstage, hopefully.

I’m a believer in trusting the director.

The Office’ is less a comedy than so many other “comedies” that have been on the air. It’s really about the balance between what is real and what is comic.

At around 19 I realized that I really didn’t have any skills other than making people laugh, so I should probably pursue it full-time.

Whenever I’ve been in rehearsals, it’s really fun, there’s always laughing.

I’m not comically oriented. I get angry and I start complaining and then people start laughing. I don’t even want them to laugh half the time.

It’s really about committing super-hard to whatever you’re trying to create. In essence, I’m just copying my favorite comedic actors, and it’s the people who make me laugh the hardest who commit the hardest.

We all look to have transcendent experiences that lift us out of the everyday, and fear is a good one. But, I think it’s the same reason why people want to laugh their heads off.

I just consider myself a piece of the puzzle and I’m lucky enough to be asked or invited to the party, if you will. I hope I can bring some laughs and grimaces to the fans.

My new shorty got a gymnastic back, ’87 emerald green on a classic Jag. She had the cleft palate, I ordered chef’s salad; She had the club foot, with that little arm, I couldn’t help but laugh…she ordered Chicken Parm.

We laugh at the efforts of the musk deer to find the source of the scent which comes from itself and despair at our efforts to find the peace which is our essence.